Was the FBI’s raid of Georgia’s Fulton County elections office legal?
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What recent developments have raised concerns among election officials?
Two recent elections-related developments are playing out today that have some election officials concerned. The first relates to the FBI seizure of election documents in Georgia, a state whose election President Donald Trump continues to falsely claim he won in 2020. The second involves recent public comments made by the president that elections should be nationalized in 15 states. Both of these actions may be illegal as the Trump administration crossed a line. Hello and welcome to USA Today's The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Friday, February 6th, 2026.
What happened during the FBI's raid of the Fulton County elections office?
Here to help me unpack this important and involving story is USA Today Justice Department correspondent, Asha Bakshi. Asha, thanks for hopping on.
sure thing happy to be here asia start us off please by telling us about the raid where was it and what happened this raid was at a very large election center in fulton county it's the fulton county election hub near atlanta it's a hub that actually i've been to a couple times i was covering the 2024 national elections down in georgia It's a very important hub when it comes to vote tabulation and it stores a lot of voting records.
What evidence is the FBI seeking in relation to the 2020 election?
And this is tied to much of Atlanta. Fulton County is the most populous county in Georgia. So it's a very important county for understanding what happens in the state as a whole. Joe Biden's win there in 2020 helped propel him to victory across the nation. And the FBI conducted a raid here where it was authorized by a search warrant to seize physical ballots, to seize ballot images, and to see some records tied to vote counting, vote tabulation in Fulton County, all in relation to the 2020 election.
And has the FBI given a compelling reason for the raid? What did they say they were investigating?
The FBI has been pretty tight lipped when it comes to this investigation. When I reached out to them, they told me just that they were engaged in some sort of court authorized law enforcement activity.
What legal challenges are being posed against the FBI's actions?
But the search warrant that they used to conduct this raid has been released. And that tells us something about what they are looking at. It cited two different criminal statutes. One has to do with maintaining voting records, that those records have to be maintained after a federal election for 22 months. So it looks like part of what they're looking at is whether Fulton County did that after the 2020 election. And then the second one has to do with potential threats or coercion or fraud in relation to the voting process itself. So it looks like the FBI is looking into some sort of potential crime related to that.
How did Trump's legal efforts relate to the Georgia election?
What specifically that involves, we don't know. The government would have submitted an affidavit in which they would have described specifically what the details really are of what they're looking at here. But that affidavit remains under seal. So we haven't really gotten a picture of the evidence that a magistrate judge looked at when she signed this warrant. It is true that for a judge to sign a warrant, the judge has to find that there's something called probable cause. That means basically just looking at the evidence that the government presented, a judge is saying that there's a reasonable belief that a crime may have occurred. It's not the type of process that you have when you have two sides often in criminal cases, you know, making their cases.
But it does say that the judge saw something that she thought gave the government license to seize these records.
Perhaps the biggest question looming over the FBI's action is one of legality. What are the experts saying here?
It's a bit of a challenge for legal experts right now because there's so much we don't know. Because the affidavit hasn't been released, we don't actually know what evidence the government presented to a judge. So it's hard for outside legal experts to be able to weigh in too much on what happened here.
What is the significance of the statute of limitations in this case?
But we do know that Fulton County has filed a motion challenging the legality of the search warrant and basically asking a court to make the government return all the records it seized and to halt the government from searching the records, doing anything with those records until a judge has decided whether Fulton County should win on its motion.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What recent developments have raised concerns among election officials?
0:03–0:42
2
What happened during the FBI's raid of the Fulton County elections office?
0:42–1:22
3
What evidence is the FBI seeking in relation to the 2020 election?
1:22–2:11
4
What legal challenges are being posed against the FBI's actions?
2:11–2:51
5
How did Trump's legal efforts relate to the Georgia election?
2:51–4:07
6
What is the significance of the statute of limitations in this case?
4:07–5:40
7
What implications could the raid have on future elections?
5:40–6:43
8
What statements has Trump made regarding nationalizing elections?
6:43–15:56